EP.186 Say You Want to Live - 2
As the Captain said, the situation was not over yet.
"This disturbance is being appropriately responded to with resistance occurring in various places... However, the Shadows' goal is not the success of this disturbance, but causing the disturbance itself."
I know that too.
Ultimately, the Shadows' purpose was to clean up the back alleys. They scattered their personnel in all directions to spread these sparks and smoke even further.
Although their intentions were read in advance and they were defeated individually, their purpose itself had already been achieved.
"The military nation's taboos that they possessed have already been scattered everywhere. If the military authorities obtain any clues about the taboos, even if the disturbance isn't large, they won't overlook this incident. It's too late. We should have stopped them before they caused this situation..."
The bad thing about war and conflict is that while it takes two, one side can unilaterally start it.
No matter how we respond, the fact that a fight occurred cannot be denied. In that process, if the military nation obtains information about Hameln, they will try to erase everything related to it.
"The Shadows... succeeded. I failed to stop them. If only I had moved a little sooner..."
From the Captain, I could sense something akin to despair and discouragement. Perhaps within that, there might also be some resentment toward me who acted recklessly.
But she couldn't just blame me. From the Captain's perspective, the one she resented most was herself.
'I wasted too much time. I couldn't even use my own life in time...'
The Shadows' operation. Cause a disturbance to draw the military nation's attention, then scatter the taboos to make the military nation clean up.
The Captain tried to use her life to stop them in response. She planned to stop by a nearby office to deliver a warning to the communications headquarters, and use herself as bait to be killed, thereby calling in the military police.
Because if a signal soldier met with a suspicious accident, the communications headquarters would unconditionally dispatch an investigation team.
It might have been a decent plan. If she had succeeded in her operation, even if she couldn't eradicate the Shadows, at least the military nation would have kept them in check.
But my plan was a little different.
"It's okay! That's what the signal soldier is for!"
The Captain blinked, not understanding. Toward her, I spoke with an endlessly bright smile.
Purely, pretending to be innocent.
"Even though you told me to keep it secret, Captain, you're actually a signal soldier! One who can directly convey opinions to the high-ranking officials of the military nation!"
"...Negative, I am..."
When the denial came out, I asked back with eyes wide open like a child whose gift had been taken away.
"Huh? You can't even contact the upper echelons? You're a signal soldier? That signal soldier who contacts everywhere using golems?"
Words feigning endless innocence, as if not knowing anything about the background circumstances. The Captain, while flustered, stated only the truth clearly.
"Simply stating the facts, affirmative. I can contact the upper echelons. However."
"Then that's enough!"
I smiled broadly.
They say you can't spit on a smiling face. The Captain was speechless at my innocent smile.
"Captain Abby, who spent several days with me in the back alleys, would know everything about what happened this time, who the opponent is and what they're after, and who the true identity of the Shadows who know the taboos is! If Captain Abby puts in a little more effort, thanks to an unnecessary 'misunderstanding' by the military nation, there won't be any wrong moves they'll make!"
At my words full of expectation, the Captain panicked and became restless.
That was only natural. The Captain, whose identity was revealed to me, could not return as a signal soldier. She had no intention of returning to headquarters alive, nor could she.
"Wait. That is..."
But that was classified, and I pressed on, pretending not to know.
"Huh? Surely you're not saying you can't? The lives of the back alley people are at stake here!"
I asked again with an expression of not understanding at all.
"300,000. The lives of 300,000 in the back alleys are at stake. Just the people connected to today's incident, big and small, number 300,000! If the Families collapse, most of the beastmen will shrink back, and if the Market is raided, the back alley economy will be paralyzed. The shelter goes without saying. Someone's family, friends, lovers could disappear overnight. If you don't help, Captain!"
Instantly, a shadow fell over the Captain's face. What finally came to the Captain's mind was a dreary door firmly closed in some alley.
The world doesn't only have comedies. For the Captain who loved people's lives, the lonely death flowing from behind a closed door was hard to turn away from.
The door that wouldn't open no matter how much they knocked and shouted.
A cold death that didn't even come into view in this rough and difficult back alley, barely remembered only by the Captain who witnessed it by chance with two friends.
After leaving the windowless room, the Captain learned joy and sorrow. She came to seek joy and avoid sorrow.
That's why she tried to step forward for the back alley people.
"The military nation might easily abandon them. But, Captain Abby. The Captain I've spent time with isn't that cold-hearted, is she? You enjoyed Anna's food, liked the citizens who chatted together, and savored labor and its rewards. You're a kind person who affirms life itself—difficult but rewarding—aren't you?"
The shackles she had to experience precisely because she was kind.
Excessive empathy suppressed beneath the shackles of logic and principle.
The virtue of saints and saintesses—paring away oneself to give to others.
The reason the military nation had no choice but to lock the signal soldier in a windowless room now manifested in the Captain.
"Even if the military nation abandons them, you won't abandon them, will you, Captain? Anna too, Smen too, or Shopkeeper Crin and Paparazzi Neru too. Or the veterans in the shelter and the orphans they care for. You'll do your best for everyone, won't you?"
"...I, cannot."
"Huh? You won't help?"
If she tries hard, maybe she can save them. Because signal soldiers have the power to control information. The status of signal soldiers isn't high, but they can certainly move the military nation.
However, there is one problem.
"...You must not. Do it."
A signal soldier must be objective.
If subjectivity mixes into information, if intention seeps into it. That poison will hover over the entire military nation and eat away at the country. Flowing along the nerves, it will cause functional disorders in the body made of iron and blood.
The signal soldier—that too is a taboo of the military nation. One of the most significant secrets the military nation tried to hide.
"I must not do so."
That's why the signal soldier, despite having such a disposition, had to imprison herself in loneliness. She had to manifest her empathy only through her unique magic to limited places.
"Why? Why exactly can't you?"
"...It's classified."
'Because I am a signal soldier whose identity must never be revealed... Because rather than surviving with my identity exposed, I must die. Because that is the principle.'
Alright, it's about time.
Time to shatter the principles the military nation created.
"Captain Abby. Do I look like a fool to you?"
'Partially... affirmative.'
That's a bit. I don't want to shoot the messenger because of the message, but I don't want to hear that from you.
"Captain Abby, when we first met in the metal box, you bit down on the suicide poison, right?"
"..."
"Then you told me to receive the death compensation because you'd marry me, and you're wandering the streets alone without any combat ability. Even abnormal behaviors become inevitable when they pile up one by one. Do I look like a fool? Or are you just playing dumb knowing the truth?"
There's no answer. Because both were partially affirmative. That I was truly just a foolish bystander... or, they hoped so.
Because if I were astute and clever enough to extract classified information using the signal soldier, then from the moment the identity was discovered, I would have threatened the military nation.
"Well, let's say you're the world's most outstanding suicide candidate. But is your self-destructive desire more precious than the lives of the back alley people? If you alone become happy by dying, is it okay to just stand by while so many become unfortunate?"
"Why would I become happy!"
The Captain, provoked by my baseless slander, answered.
"I don't want to die either! Who in the world would want to die! If only I could keep living...!"
"Then just live. Live as a signal soldier and help the back alley people here a little."
"But! Because it's a principle that must be upheld no matter what, I act on it!"
"What about the people left behind? The Market, the Families, the shelter too. And the people connected to all those various groups. You'll just abandon them? They're also members of the military nation, aren't they?"
The Captain now realized the essence of the dilemma facing her.
To uphold the principle, she must die herself. Since she was dying anyway, she tried to uncover the conspiracy surrounding this back alley. Using her own life.
But the current situation is...
"If you don't break the principle, everyone you knew will end up in trouble."
For herself.
For others.
For ideals.
The signal soldier followed her ideals. For the sake of principle, she easily discarded her own life. In the midst of that, she even decided to use it for others since she was going to use it anyway.
I confirmed that heart.
"Signal soldier. You can live. No, you must live. Otherwise, everyone you encountered today will be in danger."
Alright, that's understood. Now the next step.
Can the Captain, who can sacrifice herself for principle, sacrifice principle for others?
"How about it, Captain Abby? Can you do it? Can you leave alone, leaving all these people behind?"
I asked, and the Captain didn't answer. No, she couldn't answer.
The most useful tool created by the military nation had predetermined the answer for such times. However, that tool was inherently incomplete and kept causing errors.
The emotion that emerged at the end was anxiety.
"...There's no guarantee, is there."
"What guarantee?"
Alright, so the mask is coming off a little.
There's no guarantee that the military nation won't find out.
Rather than a clean death, an even more terrible death reached through torture and interrogation might be prepared.
Just as I was preparing a rebuttal to that, the Captain lowered her head and spoke anxiously.
"There's no guarantee that not following my duty would be better... Whether my actions would be worth breaking the principle for... There's no such guarantee, is there."
Tears were dripping from the Captain's eyes. In contrast, her expression was drier than any I had ever seen. It was like watching a golem shed tears.
It was the moment when the machine with the most outstanding performance created by the military nation regained its human heart.
"I learned it as the signal soldier's iron rule, and acted on it. That a signal soldier bears such duty, that such responsibility is demanded of a signal soldier... So, if my deviation leads to a greater tragedy. If breaking the principle leads to an even more terrible result...? What should I do?"
Rather than what would happen to herself, anxiety about whether her actions were right. She was afraid that she might ruin everything out of her own greed.
It was similar to the heart of a believer seeking God, thirsting for faith.
Perhaps, to the signal soldier, that small box was a temple and the military nation was faith.
Then am I the devil trying to free the signal soldier?
Smiling anew, I declared to the Captain.